Join Facebook (without gaining 100s of unwanted friends!)

You may have friends and relatives who share their photos on Facebook and you can't view them because you're not on Facebook.

Or, you may want to join a Facebook group and you can't because you're not on Facebook.

So, you'd quite like to join Facebook.

But you don't want:

• hundreds of new (and unwanted) "friends"
• numerous requests from people who want to be your friend
• your personal details spread all over the internet.

I'm not a "Facebook" expert but the following guide sets out what's possible (at the time of writing - things may change!).

You don't want hundreds of new (and unwanted) "friends".

No problem - you're in control.

No one can become your "friend" unless you click to accept them.

You don't want numerous requests from people who want to be your friend.

Go to: Privacy Settings > How you connect > Edit Settings > Who can send you friend requests?

Now, you'll notice that the most restrictive setting is "Friends of friends".

The only way to avoid getting any "friend" requests is to have no "friends" - if you don't have any "friends" there are no "friends of friends" to send you requests!

This may be practical if your only reason for joining Facebook is to gain access to a Facebook group. Otherwise (having no "friends') is likely to be be impractical - for example, you may want to look at some photos that (real world) friends  have posted but they may have set their account so that you have to be a (Facebook) "friend" to view them.

So, you may want some friends, in which case the "Friends of friends" setting is at least damage limitation. And, if you get do get "friend" requests from "friends of friends" you don't have to accept them.

A theoretical consideration is that, if you have friends who have a lot of "friends", there are more potential "friend" requests. For example, if you have a "friend" who has 500 "friends", that's 500 people who could send you a "friend" request but in practice, I suspect that's very unlikely to happen!


You don't want your personal details made available on the internet.

You have a lot of control over this via the "Edit Profile" button. You'll also see a "View as…" button which lets you see how other people see you page.

Accessing my Facebook page will simply show you my name and a profile photo.

The photo is optional - you don't have a add one!

However, it could actually be useful to have your photo on display. It may stop someone sending you a friend request thinking you are someone else (of the same name).

A final but important tip: go through all the Accounts Settings, Privacy Settings and Profile Settings in detail. Don't assume that the default settings will be OK, the default settings may not be set for maximum privacy!

Please comment below if you have anything to add (or you think anything is incorrect!).